(2020) Punishment and Protest. In: Radzik, L. (Ed.) the Ethics of Social Punishment
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Pettigrove, G. (2020) Punishment and protest. In: Radzik, L. (ed.) The Ethics of Social Punishment. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, UK, pp. 113-134. ISBN 9781108836067. There may be differences between this version and the published version. You are advised to consult the publisher’s version if you wish to cite from it. http://eprints.gla.ac.uk/219289/ Deposited on: 30 June 2020 Enlighten – Research publications by members of the University of Glasgow http://eprints.gla.ac.uk Chapter Six Punishment and Protest Glen Pettigrove1 I. The Comedian On Tuesday, 4 December 2018, the comedian, Kevin Hart, announced that he had accepted an invitation from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to host the televised broadcast of the 2019 Oscar Awards ceremony. While many applauded the Academy’s choice, not everyone was happy. The writer, Benjamin Lee, responded to the announcement by tweeting ‘And the Oscar for most homophobic host ever goes to …’ followed by a quote from a stand-up routine Hart had performed a number of times – including in his film Seriously Funny (2010) – in which he says, ‘One of my biggest fears is my son growing up and being gay.’2 In a follow-up tweet, Lee posted screen shots from Hart’s Twitter account that featured gay slurs, along with the caption, ‘I wonder when Kevin Hart is gonna start deleting all his old tweets.’3 And on Wednesday Lee published an op-ed in The Guardian documenting Hart’s use of homophobic language, his role in homophobic movies like ‘Get Hard’ and ‘The Wedding Ringer’, and his refusal to apologise for homophobic jokes over the years.4 Lee was not alone in objecting to Hart’s behaviour. Awards Watch founder, Erik Anderson, tweeted, ‘Considering how many of the Oscars’ biggest fans are women and gay men it’s quite something for the Academy to hire a guy who beat one wife, cheated on another when she was eight months pregnant and said one of his biggest fears is his son growing up and being gay.’5 Comedian Billy Eichner tweeted, ‘Many of us have jokes/tweets we regret. I’m ok with tasteless jokes, depending on context. What bothers me about these is you can tell it’s not just a joke-there’s real truth, anger & fear behind these.’6 Zack Sharf and Michael Blackmon published articles on IndieWire and BuzzFeed expressing similar concerns.7 And hundreds of people reposted Lee’s, Anderson’s, Eichner’s, Sharf’s, and Blackmon’s remarks on various social media sites, adding their own comments to the groundswell of criticism. For example, Lee’s original tweet was shared more than 400 times and liked by over 1,000 readers. 1 Forthcoming in Linda Radzik et al., The Ethics of Social Punishment, Cambridge University Press. 2 Benjamin Lee@benfraserlee, Twitter, 4 December 2018, https://twitter.com/benfraserlee/status/1070134637605867520?lang=en. The relevant portion of Seriously Funny can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dd2M6WyQ9Bk (accessed 20 February 2019). 3 Benjamin Lee@benfraserlee, Twitter, 5 December 2018, https://twitter.com/benfraserlee/status/1070413541012893696?lang=en (accessed 20 February 2019). 4 Benjamin Lee, ‘Oscar Host Kevin Hart’s Homphobia Is No Laughing Matter,’ The Guardian, 5 December 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/dec/05/oscars-host-kevin-hart-homophobia-is-no-laughing- matter (accessed 20 February 2019). 5 Erik Anderson@awards_watch, Twitter, 5 December 2018, https://twitter.com/awards_watch/status/1070144276447653888 (accessed 28 February 2019). 6 Billie Eichner@billyeichner, Twitter, 6 December 2018, https://twitter.com/billyeickner/status/1070750816649207809 (accessed 28 February 2019). 7 Zack Sharf, ‘Kevin Hart Called out for Homophobic Jokes after Being Named 2019 Oscars Host,’ Indie Wire, 5 December 2018, https://www.indiewire.com/2018/12/kevin-hart-homophobic-abusive-past-oscars-host- 1202025494/; Michael Blackmon, ‘Kevin Hart Is Deleting Old Anti-Gay Tweets after Being Announced as Oscars Host,’ BuzzFeed, 6 December 2018, https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/michaelblackmon/kevin- hart-homophobic-tweets-gay-oscars?bftwnews&utm_term=4ldqpgc#4ldqpgc (accessed 28 February 2019). And the post that included images of Hart’s old tweets was re-tweeted more than 900 times and liked by more than 2,000 people. The Academy tried to defuse the situation by approaching Hart and telling him that if he wished to host the Oscars, he would need to apologise for his past remarks. In response, Hart posted a video on Instagram in which he offered excuses – those remarks are old, I’m not the same man I was when I made them, and I have already apologised for them – and refused to apologise. Rather than acknowledging the hurt he might have caused others, he dismissed those who objected to his behaviour as ‘internet trolls’ and ‘haters’ who were out to destroy him.8 And he found himself out of a job. The Kevin Hart case is an example of what has become a remarkably familiar type. An individual behaves badly. Someone else – the recipient of the treatment, a friend, or a bystander – calls them out in a newspaper article, a blogpost, a tweet, a Facebook status, or a YouTube video. A number of those who read the post or watch the video repost it with additional criticism. And both the original post and subsequent repostings attract comments from a still wider audience that is eager to add its voice to the chorus of those condemning the misdeed and its perpetrator. Linda Radzik’s insightful discussion of informal social punishment offers us a way to interpret occurrences of this type. She sees them as cases of punishment, albeit a punishment administered by one’s peers using informal means. I will offer an alternative way to read them, namely as protest. Since the norms for protest differ from those for punishment, the fact that many situations can be read as both protest and punishment poses a challenge for Radzik’s attempt to use the category of informal social punishment to determine whether a particular course of action is permissible. In section II I provide a brief summary of Radzik’s account of social punishment and show how it helps us make sense of the Kevin Hart case. Section III describes a case that in many ways resembles Hart’s, namely that of William Sitwell. But whereas the actions in the Hart case appear to be an example of justified informal social punishment, section IV argues that those in the Sitwell case do not. Section V introduces an alternative concept, namely PROTEST, and suggests that protesting is governed by different norms than punishing. The final section shows that the Hart and Sitwell cases can also be read as instances of justified protest. This raises questions both about how we should choose between competing readings of a case and about the link between justified protest/punishment and justified action. II. Justified Social Punishment In line with standard views, Radzik takes punishment to have five distinguishing features.9 First, it harms the one on whom it is inflicted. The harm need not be an all-things- considered harm. For example, someone may ultimately benefit from being punished because it teaches him a lesson. Nevertheless, at the time it is administered punishment must be something its recipient would prefer to forego. Second, for the harm to be punishment it must be intentionally inflicted. Injuries that are caused inadvertently can be every bit as painful, but if they are not inflicted knowingly and with the purpose of punishing, they are not punitive. Third, the harm must also be reactive. That is to say, it must be a response to the other party’s failure to fulfil an obligation. Fourth, punitive actions are reprobative. Part of their aim is to ‘express disapproval of the one being punished.’10 Fifth, the person administering the harm must be authorised to do so. If they are not, their action is at best a form of vigilantism. Finally, 8 kevinhart4real, Instagram, 7 December 2018, https://www.instagram.com/p/BrEjHFCFe83/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_medium=loading (accessed 28 February 2019). 9 Linda Radzik, ‘Defining Social Punishment,’ 10-12. 10 Radzik, ‘Defining,’ 11. 2 what sets informal social punishment apart from punishment of other kinds is that it takes place between ‘social equals’ rather than between a superior and a subordinate.11 Returning to the Kevin Hart example, it looks like a clear instance of what Radzik is discussing. Kevin Hart was harmed by the criticism levelled against him. He suffered the pain of widespread, public shaming. He also lost his place on the biggest stage in the business and the prestige, publicity, and income that went with it. The harm was caused intentionally by (at least some of) those who criticised his behaviours. Admittedly the overarching aim of the members of the Academy who decided Hart needed to apologise or forego hosting the event was probably not to punish him. It was to avoid backlash from participants and prospective viewers who object to discrimination aimed at members of the LGBTQ+ community and from organisations like GLAAD (the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) who campaign on their behalf. However, the intentionally chosen means to that end was to subject Hart to treatment he would rather have avoided. So it, too, would seem to fall under the heading of ‘intentionally harming’ broadly construed. The harmful actions were intended to express disapproval of Hart and his failure to respect those whose sexual orientation differs from his own. Moreover, insofar as all members of the moral community have the standing to criticise actions that harm or disrespect innocent others and the Academy has the right to decide whom it will employ, the public and the Academy were authorised to act as they did.